Economic growth at 7-8 pc achievable — Jalan

The next 10-20 years of planning would be crucial to put India on a fast development track, he said, adding in the last three years, the country had gone through many hurdles such as economic sanctions, Asian crises and hike in oil prices.

“India has managed to overcome these obstacles in a successful manner and the most positive feature is the resurgence of confidence in ourselves,” the RBI Governor said.

On the macro-economic front, he said, the situation was much better today than what it was some 20-25 years ago. “While the country was meeting demand in the food and agriculture sector, Information Technology (IT) has added a new dimension to the whole economic scenario,” he pointed out.

Jalan said that lack of proper physical and social infrastructure, extreme poverty, inadequate education and continuous fiscal deficit, both at the centre and state level could pose a problem for the economic growth in the new millennium. “All these problems are existing where government is a primary provider of such public services,” the Governor said, adding that these services were suffering in delivery and not monetarily.

Former Union Finance Minister and Rajya Sabha member Manmohan Singh said a blind pursuit of western consumer-oriented economy would not help India to overcome the basic problems of poverty and lack of primary eduction.